Employee Experience at VodafoneZiggo: ‘Understand People to Exceed Their Expectations’

VodafoneZiggo aims to place people at the heart of all its operations as a core strategic objective, with a strong focus on the employee experience. Heleen Mes, an expert in this field, spoke with Dorien Hendriksen, Senior Employee Experience Manager, about her experiences. “When we fully committed to the employee experience and picked up the pace, we started making real progress.”

In 2018, VodafoneZiggo began its journey with employee experience (EX). Work environments that contribute significantly to employees’ happiness and well-being are known to be more successful. After the merger of Vodafone and Ziggo, the company renewed its commitment: in all areas, VodafoneZiggo prioritizes people, whether in its role within society, with customers, or with employees.

A Pleasant and Healthy Work Environment

Dorien Hendriksen, Senior Employee Experience Manager, says, “To meet and exceed people’s expectations, you need to truly know and understand them: their needs, desires, frustrations, and habits. What makes them happy? What solutions align with that? This is something that involves the entire organization. The Senior Leadership Team asked HR, ‘What can HR contribute to this?’ After all, everything starts with happy employees. Happy employees ultimately lead to happy customers. NPS (Net Promoter Score) is an important KPI here.”

A Unique Definition of Employee Experience

To successfully put people first, it’s crucial to have a clear definition of an excellent experience. At the start, VodafoneZiggo defined what an excellent employee experience (EX) should look like. Hendriksen explains, “There are plenty of definitions out there, but you need to tailor them to your organization. The definition should answer questions like: What does a pleasant and healthy work environment look like for our employees? What do they experience?”

“We focus on a triangle: 1. The mission and ambition of the organization, 2. Employees’ needs, and 3. The ability to do their job well so they can fully realize their potential. These elements need to align. For research and innovation, we use the same human-centered design thinking approach for both customers and employees.”

Scaling for Greater Impact

Initially, VodafoneZiggo tackled each issue one by one. While this yielded valuable insights, it didn’t yet provide the momentum VodafoneZiggo was looking for. So, they scaled up, creating the right energy: old habits gave way to new ways of thinking and working that stuck. Overarching themes emerged, and certain solutions were effective across multiple journeys. This approach has made the changes more visible and brought efficiency. Employees responded enthusiastically as well, according to Hendriksen.

Journey Owners

The employee journey is divided into eight strategic journeys—chronological steps—ranging from ‘Interested in Working at VodafoneZiggo’ to ‘Developing and Growing.’ Employees are also categorized into four groups: retail staff, technicians, customer service, and office employees.

Each strategic journey has a dedicated journey owner within HR. The journey owner assembles a multidisciplinary team to map and optimize the employee experience. They are responsible for gathering insights into needs and preferences, brainstorming and implementing ideas together, testing and evaluating, and, of course, providing feedback.

As an employee experience expert, Hendriksen organizes the workflow, quarterly planning, ensures solutions align with organizational goals, and oversees initiatives to strengthen the brand. She maintains an overview of all solutions in progress to ensure efficiency across all journeys. It’s crucial for all initiatives to contribute to an authentic, consistent, and above all, enjoyable employee experience.

5-Day Design Kick-Off

Each strategic journey starts with a 5-day kick-off spread over one month. These days focus on a design challenge tailored to a specific target group, such as “Starting at VodafoneZiggo for Retail Staff.” Hendriksen explains, “We plan five days over a month to work ‘live’ with a multidisciplinary team—such as HR, IT, Facility Management, Communication specialists, managers, and the employees themselves. All eight parts of the strategic journey are addressed over the course of a year.”

“We follow a set framework: first, we map existing information and insights about the employee experience. What do we already know? What are assumptions? Valuable tools to chart emotions, needs, frustrations, and behavior are empathy maps and journey maps. This prepares us for further research with short interviews of up to 30 minutes with employees. Based on the findings, we formulate design challenges based on employee needs. Then, the creative process begins: designing and testing solutions and prototypes.”

“The best and most valuable part of design thinking is speaking with employees, your target audience. Our headquarters, for example, is above a store, so we can simply go downstairs and ask our questions to retail staff. It’s easy to connect with employees from different departments. With good preparation, you can learn a lot in just a few minutes. Employees are eager to participate and proudly share their contributions with colleagues.”

Advice for Starting with Employee Experience

What advice does Hendriksen give to organizations and HR professionals starting with employee experience? “Employee experience is linked to many factors on multiple levels. It involves strategy, culture, leadership, communication, and many practical aspects. To make progress, you need to keep it small and take action: ‘What can I do now?’ Otherwise, you risk stalling. Keeping up the momentum is crucial. Design thinking works very well for this. It makes everyone happy! As a new EX expert, focus on mastering this method.”

Making it Personal with Behavioral Design and AI

According to Hendriksen, two knowledge areas are becoming increasingly important: behavioral design, or behavioral expertise, and AI. “I have high expectations for both; they will greatly benefit organizations because so much is already possible. A great experience combines getting the basics right and running smoothly with personalized interactions. This is where your unique value lies. You can only get the basics right if you understand human behavior well. Technology and AI can help you create simple, user-friendly solutions. The efficiency offered by technology and AI also creates room for meaningful, personal interactions. Which ones make a real impact, and how do you structure them? Organizations should certainly explore these areas for the benefit of EX.”